TUKTOYAKTUK - Martha Eleen is aware she's an outsider.

When the Toronto artist first visited Tuktoyaktuk two years ago, she asked permission to paint the summertime views she encountered, until slowly she became part of them herself.

Martha Eleen, a painter who teaches at the Toronto School of Art, is currently instructing art workshops in Tuktoyaktuk until April for residents who are interested in developing artist portfolios. - Katie May/NNSL photo

She painted a series of 25 paintings, titled Distant Early Warning, that depicts blue skies, the shoreline, select buildings around town and rows of hanging muktuk.

"A lot of people stopped to see what I was doing and told me about drawing and painting that they've done and talked about wanting to develop that," she said.

Upon seeing her work in Toronto, Eleen's neighbour, Bill Nasogaluak, recognized a painting as the view from his brother Joe Nasogaluak's house.

"The thing that I got from the landscape up there is that it really belongs to the people up there. I felt a little bit invasive taking the images because it's different than down south, where you can buy a piece of land but you don't own the history of it, whereas in Tuk, their history is so embedded in the landscape," she said.

"If you're painting, it's a very slow process of becoming more and more present to where you are, so part of that is getting to know people and observing the landscape over a period of time so you're actually part of it."

Now, Eleen is back in Tuk to pass on her skills in two workshops, one for adults and one for children, where she'll teach visual language skills such as colour mixing and light and shadow variation for all skill levels - the "tools you need to produce art," she added.

"I just had this feeling that it made a lot more sense for people from Tuk to paint their landscape, because it's theirs," Eleen said.

The Tuk Community Corporation applied for funding to bring Eleen back for the workshops through the NWT Arts Council, and Eleen, excited about being involved in the project, did some fundraising on her own.

The Toronto School of Art is also offering bursaries for further study to two participants in the workshops, which began March 8.

At the end of the sessions in April, Eleen plans to showcase all the work, including children's paintings of their neighbourhoods, at a community exhibit. She said she sees a real future for art in the North.

"Aboriginal artists from the North make a lot of money - there's a real market for that and it's the total opposite for me in Toronto. Someone in Toronto kind of gives up all hope of ever having a proper income if they choose to be an artist, but that's different up North."